Sequence Sequence Sequence

One of my mentors, Alice Woodyard, believes that one of the most important aspects of retriever field training is not onlyhow each behavior is trained, but the order in which behaviors are trained. Her acronym for this concept is "SSS", for sequence-sequence-sequence. In Alice's experience, getting the sequence wrong can have negative consequences for a field retriever's career.

Unfortunately, no exact SSS for training a retriever exists. The reason is that a second factor, the "it depends" factor, is also in play. Different dogs need information presented to them in different ways, and only an experienced trainer can make the call for a particular dog.

Nonetheless, here is an outline of what I think might be an appropriate SSS for 2Q retriever field training [this is a draft; each item will eventually be shown as a link to a detailed discussion of the drill]:

• Show Me game (fetch without retrieve to hand). Note: Retrieve to hand (the cues Hold, Out, and Fetch trained in that order) should eventually be trained, but the training of retrieve to hand should be delayed until puppy has strong motivation for pick-up and return from Show Me game. Show Me can be played often, but with only 1-3 reps per session, always ending with the dog wanting more
• Wearing the dog
• Walking recall
• Here and Sit on voice and whistle cues
• Sit to say please
• Loose-lead walking (LLW): Here's a nice Gail Fisher video on how to train this
• Walking at heel and coming to heel
• Trained retrieve: hold, out, and fetch
• Hold-and-out game (dog is sent out for an tug-toy to retrieve; as dog approaches handler with toy, handler calls "hold", then grabs toy for game of tug; then handler cues "out" and immediately throws toy again; this adds high reinforcement history for "hold" and "out")
• Fetch game (dog is placed in short-distance remote sit with nearby bird; handler calls "fetch", waits till dog picks up bird, then leads dog on merry chase; this takes the high-reinforcement prey-chase value normally associated with the send-out, and adds it to the return as well)
• Walking fetch
• Line manners (fine tuned body behaviors such as return to heel, back into heel, one-step heel, pivots L & R, sit vs. down, etc.)
• Pile work
• Wagon wheels
• Bird-foot drill
• Baseball drill
• Double-T drill
• Diversion drill
• Combo picture drill
• Combo mark-blind drill
• Triple blinds
• Entering cover
• Skimming drill with high cover
• Running hillsides
• Hip-pocket and reverse hip-pocket doubles
• Shore-handling toolkit (Note: shore-handling toolkit and swim-by can be moved anywhere after double-T, depending on availability of swim-by pond, but both are of course prerequisite to cheaters)
• Swim-by (see previous Note)
• Cheaters
• On and off a point (be sure swimming past a point is well-established first)
• Skimming drill with curved shoreline
• Up-the-shore and two-up-the-shore
• De-flaring drill

Note that in parallel with the above sequence, the dog would also have on-going experiences with field retrieves, both in private training and also, whenever possible, with groups. Because those experiences would in some cases place the dog in a situation that requires a behavior not yet trained, care must be taken that the dog not have the opportunity to self-reinforce on incorrect behaviors such as not returning with a bird. In some cases, that can be prevented with management devices such as a long line. In others, the situations can be avoided entirely, for example by not running the young dog on a retrieve where the dog is likely to cheat around water even if others in the group are doing so.

But the obvious solution of simply never running the dog in situations the dog isn't trained for is unfortunately not feasible. The reason is that getting the dog completely trained for field retrieves takes months, and for an event retriever, the most important source of motivation is not the extrinsic reinforcers that trainers use while teaching the foundation behaviors, but the intrinsic pleasure of the chase and recovery of real prey in a field setting. As trainers who have attempted a strategy of keeping the dog out of the field until the retrieve is fully trained have learned, that approach risks losing the crucial process of building motivation for the overall game of field work.

Don't Dig Holes

INTRODUCTION

I call my approach to retriever training "discovery training". It's based on the idea that performing a high-quality retrieve is deeply self-reinforcing for a retriever, so training consists of giving the dog ample opportunity to experience that reinforcement. The result is an ever stronger history of reinforcement for the high-quality retrieve, and ever more fluent performance.

A crucial corollary is that the dog NOT experience reinforcement for performing incorrect versions of the retrieve. Doing so would dig holes, actually setting the training back. Unfortunately, executing this corollary is more difficult in field work than in other sports (meaning, other sports that I have experience with).

Several reasons account for the increased difficulty. Most important, because those incorrect behaviors occur in the dog's natural setting — the field, as opposed to, for example, an obedience or agility ring — the intrinsic value of those incorrect behaviors is likely to be extremely high to the dog, compared to the temptations for incorrect behavior in other sports. Secondly, distance erodes control, and field dogs work at greater distances from the handler than in other sports. Thirdly, a phenomenon called "instinctive drift", described by the Kellers in the landmark 1951 article "Misbehavior of Organisms", seems to be more prominent in field work than the other sports. In all sports, the dog has a tendency from the beginning toward certain undesired behaviors, such as flaring at heel in obedience, or leaping over contacts in agility. But in field work, the more the dog retrieves, the more she becomes aware of her instincts to divert from the correct version of the behavior in certain ways, and senses the great pleasure available from such diversions. The result is that a trained behavior that once seemed fluent gradually unravels, because even the intrinsically self-reinforcing correct response is not as valuable as some of the possible alternatives.

Difficult or not, it remains essential that the dog not rehearse self-reinforcing incorrect responses. The dog must learn that any attempt to intentionally divert from a high-quality retrieve will ALWAYS be unsuccessful. Failure to prevent rehearsing such diversions can set your program back months, years, or even permanently. And the problem is more serious for a 2Q dog than one trained with traditional methods, because traditional trainers have powerful +P and -R training tools -- most notably the ecollar -- that the 2Q trainer does not use. The moral: Don't let the dogs learn to perform those incorrect behaviors in the first place.

Let's get to some examples.

DON'T DIG HOLES

The general rule is straightforward: Don't allow the dog to repeatedly self-reinforce on incorrect versions of the retrieve. Here are some specific examples of behaviors that can rapidly become entrenched and a nightmare to correct. I've also included suggestions for how to prevent the dog from rehearsing these undesirable behaviors:

No refused recalls on open land retrieves: Recall may be the single most difficult skill for a 2Q retriever. An open land retrieve is the easiest recall situation. If the dog doesn't immediately pick up the article and come straight back, the retrieve is too difficult for one reason or another. Could be distance, could be distractions, could be the novelty of the article, could be microclimates, could be shadows from trees, could be many other possibilities. Immediately go out and get the dog, take somewhere she can succeed, and throw some marks for her or have someone else throw. Use a gradual, incremental approach to work back to where the problem occurred, in such a way that by the time the dog is asked to perform that retrieve, she's ready to perform it correctly.

No refused recalls in everyday life: Though everyday recalls are generally easier than field recalls, training even an everyday recall is a major challenge. Published programs include Susan Smith's "90 Days to a Rock Solid Recall", Leslie Nelson's "Really Reliable Recall", and Shirley Chong's "Recall Redux". I've had excellent success with my own program, "Walking Recall".

No keep-away: If you can't get the dog by going after her, because she goes into Keep Away mode, have her wear a long line attached to her yard collar. Don't use it to jerk her, just to create a "long dog" that you can catch. Make the line as long as necessary to assure that she won't succeed at Keep Away.

No refused recalls returning thru obstacles such as high cover: Sometimes a dog who can return well on open return path will stall if she needs to go thru high cover, wetland, into a depression, into headwind, etc. If that happens, pick her up immediately (that is, go out to get her), give her some successful easier retrieves, and then work on the issue she had a problem with at shorter distances and without distractions.

No refused recalls returning across water: Returning across water can be much more difficult for a dog than other returns. One reason is that the dog may be accustomed to leaping into the water in order to avoid the feeling of having the ground drop away from her as she wades out, and she may not be able to do that when carrying an article, or it may hurt her mouth if she does leap. Even if none of those apply, dogs can be intimated by whatever distance is "big water" for that particular dog's level of experience. This can be significantly more of a problem for 2Q dogs than traditionally trained dogs, because the mental/emotional barrier may be high one, and 2Q training tools are weaker than traditional ones. To avoid this happening, never send the dog on a retrieve where you won't be able to reach her if there is any possibility she will get marooned. If she does maroon, pick her up immediately. One method with which I've had excellent success is to pick the dog up and bring her back to the start line, but leave the article back where the dog stalled. Then send the dog again, and see whether she brings the article back the second time. If not, don't keep trying this. However, it may work. Retrievers do not like to leave the article behind, and if they believe that stalling will cost them the chance to complete the retrieve, they may rapidly learn to stop stalling.

No slow pick-ups: Most retrievers naturally have soft mouths and can carry a live bird without killing it. But some dogs do kill the birds by biting down too hard while carrying it, or even by killing it for sport or out of nervousness before picking the bird up. This cannot necessarily be cured, or it may only apply to certain game. If it can't be cured for your particular dog, don't train with birds the dog cannot carry without killing them. To try curing it, run out behind the dog after sending her, urge her to fetch the bird immediately when she reaches it, and take immediate delivery. Then run back to the start line together. As soon as possible, take the dog and the live bird to a field where you can work and throw it for her a few more times. Give her the opportunity to learn that the fun doesn't stop when she brings the live bird to you, and give her an opportunity to learn how to pick the bird up and carry it without killing it.

No slipped whistles:

No breaking from the start line:

No breaking from honor:

No head swinging:

No running banks:

AN EXCEPTION: Delivery to hand

To wrap up, I'll also mention an exception to the rule of not rehearsing incorrect responses: IMO, it is neither necessary nor even desirable to require the young dog to perform a correct delivery to hand at the end of a retrieve. Instead, the dog should be permitted to keep the article as long as she wants once she has returned to the handler. She must remain fairly close to the handler, and might even crawl up into his lap if he chooses to sit on ground and welcome her. Eventually she will lose interest in the article and drop it, perhaps when called to heel for the next retrieve.

I have the following reasons for this exception. Most important, I believe that delivery to hand is somewhat aversive to at least some young retrievers, and creates the opposite reinforcement history required to train a high-quality pick-up and return. Also, I think that the problem is relatively easy to correct once the dog's habit of returning is well established, so why waste time training it when the dog's not ready? The corrected behavior will be taught during the Trained Retrieve, typically after the dog has finished teething. As the dog comes to associate delivery to hand as predicting the next opportunity to retrieve, it's relatively easy to build higher reinforcement value for the correct response than for dropping the article, and the problem tends to take care of itself.

Walking Recall

Training with the Walking Recall

I've invented many recall programs over the years, in addition to using a variety of published recall training plans.

Recently, I invented a new plan for Laddie, and I'm pleased at how effective it has been in improving Laddie's recall in general, and field recall in particular. I call this plan the "Walking Recall". Here's a description (it's essential that you also read the following section, "Cautions"):

• Equipment: yard collar and long line. I use a 40-foot line in the city, a 100-foot line in parks. (See "How I Made the Long Lines" below.)
• Take the dog for a walk. In my experience, dogs don't like to walk at steady, human pace. They like to run ahead, then sniff and fall behind, then run ahead again. Let the dog do that, continuously looping the line up in your hand when the dog gets closer, letting the line out as distance builds. Dogs love this freedom, and I feel that it opens the dog's mind for the learning that is also taking place (next steps).
• Call the dog as needed. This might happen because the dog is getting too close to a passerby, or you're about to run out of line, or the dog is about to go out in the street, or she's going on the wrong side of a tree and the line will get hung up, etc. Or maybe it's just because you feel like giving her a treat.
• For each call, call exactly once, using your standard recall cue. For field dogs, that's "Here," using the same inflection you use in the field. If the dog comes, big party, whatever the dog loves. If the dog doesn't come, gently (no jerking, no recriminations) reel her in. I think rewards are good in that situation, too: classical conditioning to the effect that coming (even if the dog has no choice) predicts good things. In addition, you might want to reward the dog if she comes to you on her own without being called.
• In my experience, a variety of high-value rewards — one or more treats, petting, a tennis ball tossed a short distance, an enthusiastic, "Yay! Good job!" — in unpredictable sequence from one recall to the next is the most powerful method of reinforcing, because it adds the additional powerful reinforcer of surprise. Even the smaller rewards gain additional value because the dog senses she's "due" for a bigger reward the next time. Unlike some trainers, I believe in reinforcing every time.
• After each recall, as soon as celebration is over, resume walking and, when the situation permits, release the dog with an explicit cue such as "OK", again letting her set her own pace.
• Time your recalls so that at least 70% do not require the dog to feel any pressure from the line. Too much of that will result in the line becoming a necessary context for a successful recall, producing a "line-wise" dog and significantly reducing the value of this training plan. Always responding correctly may mean your dog has fantastic recall, or it may mean you're not taking her into challenging situations often enough.
• Don't lure the dog, for example with treats or a swinging tug toy. If you do, she'll be learning to come for that context rather than the context you want, which is the recall cue. For the same reason, don't reach for the reward until she arrives. You don't want her watching you as she comes and stalling if she doesn't see you reaching for a reward.
• On the other hand, be prepared to reward her instantly when she arrives. If you need extra time opening the wrapper, etc., use happy talk as a conditioned secondary reinforcer, or bridge, so she can recognize the association of her behavior to the reinforcing outcome. Without the bridge, the delayed reward is significantly less effective as a reinforcer for the recall.
• Do not say the dog's name when calling her, because in field work, she will learn that her name is how you release her to retrieve a mark. If you get in the habit of saying, "Princess, here!" one day you may say, "Princess, here!" when you don't mean to and inadvertently send her racing out into the field after a difficult honor or no-bird.
• Handling 40 or 100 foot of line with a dog attached is a learned skill. It may not go smoothly at first. :0)

Cautions

Please take careful note the following:

• Don't let the dog build up speed and suddenly hit the end of the line. That's a lot more dangerous for a dog than you might expect.
• Don't grab the line while the dog is running outward. You'll get a rope burn.
• Don't let the line get underfoot. The dog might flip you if she breaks into a run.

These problems are difficult to avoid. The only solution is to watch closely and try not let dangerous situations arise. When I first started the Walking Recall with Laddie, I needed to pay attention every second.

Mechanics

Here's my experience with the mechanics of the Walking Recall.

I've got two lines, one 40' and one 100'. Some evenings, I use the 100' in Prospect Park, a humongous park in the middle of Brooklyn. I use the 40' line for our mid-day walks every day we're there.

Even the 40' line is unwieldy, but I've gotten more skillful over time. I'll try to describe it:

1. I put my left hand thru the handle at one end so that it's around my wrist as a safety measure. Of course I attach the snap hook at the other end to Laddie's collar.
2. Starting with my right hand at my left wrist, I slide the line over my right thumb as I stretch my hands apart.
3. Lightly holding the line with my right hand, I move it closer to my left hand again and loop the line over the inside of the fingers of my left hand.
4. I repeat steps (2) and (3) over and over again, like an accordion, until I've taken up all the slack.

Now we begin our walk. Of course, when Laddie moves away from me, I let loops of line fall off my left hand one loop at a time. When he moves toward me, or when he stops and I'm catching up with him, I go back to the accordion motion, again taking up the slack. I proceed in this way the entire walk.

The key here is that the line is never slack. I'm essentially a human retractible lead.

Another key is that the distances I permit are based on the control I have confidence in. Yes, I want Laddie to occasionally need the line for difficult distractions, but I'm not going to let him get 30' from me and 3' from a kid. If I see a kid coming, I call Laddie and take up the slack before there's any risk of him having enough line to get to the kid. Every once in a while, someone will surprise us and step unexpectedly out of a doorway. I just have to hope he's not scared of sweet little Golden Retrievers.

Walking Recall versus Off-lead Walking

A similar approach to the Walking Recall is to walk the dog off-lead, only calling her when you're willing to bet $100 that she'll come. It may seem as though that approach would be similarly effective, but my experience is that the Walking Recall works better.

The advantage of the long line is not only as a safety net when you guess wrong, but more importantly, that you get to practice situations where the dog is not yet ready to come on her own. I didn't realize in advance what a significant effect that would have on the training, but when I thought about it later, it sort of made sense.

For example, the dog sees a squirrel and starts toward it. Without a line, you can't be sure the dog will respond to a recall so, being smart, you don't try, and the dog runs after the squirrel. Here was a golden opportunity to practice a difficult recall, but you had to pass it up. The dog didn't rehearse a failed recall, which is good, but the dog also didn't rehearse a successful recall, which is a missed opportunity. By contrast, with the line attached, the dog does rehearse a successful recall, either by choice or by no choice.

This sort of thing could happen a dozen times in a single walk. It may not sound like it would matter that much, but I'll tell you that just a few sessions of Walking Recall substantially improved Laddie's field recall after years of training recall in other ways.

Benefits of the Walking Recall

I've found that most recall programs produce skill in particular settings, with insufficient generalization to other contexts. By contrast, the Walking Recall seems to improve the dog's overall recall response. Here's what I found with Laddie, and what I'd expect with other dogs as well:

• Naturally the dog will get better and better walking on a long line with practice. For example, she will become less and less likely to approach strangers or other dogs, because every time she does, you'll call her, and either with or without the line, she'll come to you instead. With no pay-off for attempting to approach others, she'll gradually stop trying. Similarly, she'll become increasingly less likely to try chasing a pigeon or going into the street.
• She'll become better at walking on a short lead. Though walking on a long line may be more enjoyable for her, she'll be gaining skills that enable her to walk more comfortably on a short lead as well.
• She'll become better at walking off lead. Again, the same skills will kick in, and her whole style of interacting with you on a walk will change. In fact, I would suggest that you not walk the dog off lead until you can depend on her recall, even in confined space. You don't want to go back to having her learn that she can ignore you.
• Most importantly from my point of view, her field recall will dramatically improve. Granted, a field recall is different from walking on a lead, but my experience is that the dog's responsiveness to "Here", even from hundreds of yards away, improves remarkably after just a few sessions of the Walking Recall, despite years of previous recall training.

How I Made the Long Lines

I'll end with a note on how I made the long lines:

1. I went to an outdoors store and purchased climber's webbing, great stuff for this purpose. I got a little extra length to allow for the sewing.
2. I went to a hardware store and bought a snap hook.
3. I brought the materials to a shoe repair shop, and asked them to attach the snap hook at one end of the webbing, and to make a handle at the other end. I brought along a commercial leash to show them what the stitches looked like.

I'm sure the materials are available online if you don't mind waiting a few days to receive them.

Honoring

[Here's a discussion of training steadiness, especially on the honor, on the PGD list:]

On Apr 19, 2010, at 1:50 PM, Amanda wrote:

Secondly, how do I start training the Honor. I am a newbie to field training, and I have a VERY noisy Toller in the blind, who screams and cries once the calls start. She is not steady on the line (working on this as well.) I have started to stand facing the opposite direction as someone suggested last week, but need to know what else I should be doing. C/T for quiet doesn't seem effective as she is off food once birds are in sight.....

Thanks for the kind words, Amanda.

And congrats on having a Toller. I love Tollers.

Here are my suggestions on the honor:

(1) Never miss an opportunity to honor after running your series. I don't care if you're the only one out there honoring, that's their loss. IMO, the single most important key to learning to honor is having the dog understand that first you run your series, then you honor. You, little miss Toller, will never be sent on those throws a second time, so you may as well relax. Try to arrange to run in front of someone who's going to run an interesting series -- preferably a multiple -- so you get a good honor opportunity.

(2) Yes, use a totally different posture for honoring than for running the dog. That's actually two things: First, develop a nice, consistent set of line mechanics. And second, do something completely different for honoring. This may be more of an issue for 2Q dogs than 4Q dogs. I often see people stand next to an honor dog no differently to my eye than if the dog were marking, yet the dog is completely relaxed and in no danger of breaking. Must be nice, but until my dogs are like that, I do like you do and face backwards, always off the dog's right hip. I also use a special cue -- "Just watch", repeated quietly over and over, with an occasional "Sit" thrown in -- that of course I save exclusively for that context.

(3) I cannot emphasize this enough: The dog must never succeed in breaking. Ever. Either train a controlled break -- good luck doing that with a young 2Q dog, but if you can, great -- or have the dog on a tab in any practice situation where there is even the faintest possibility of her breaking. Do NOT rely on the thrower picking up the bird. The dog's adrenaline-pumping outrun is still too much reinforcement for the break, even if the dog doesn't get to pick up the bird.

A tab is a short line attached to the dog's collar like any lead and with a knot at the other end for traction. L&L's tabs are 9" so they can't catch in the dog's toes when running. Of course you don't want the dog to become tab wise, that is, only being steady when wearing the tab. So put the collar with tab on at the beginning of every practice, and take it off at the end. The dog then has no idea why she's wearing it, and becomes habituated to it. Alice would say the tab becomes "neutral". When honoring (and also at the start line if the dog is at risk of breaking), hold the tab tightly but with a slight amount of slack. The slack is so that (a) the dog has no idea you're holding it and tab awareness doesn't become part of the context for not breaking, and (b) the dog can't build up any momentum and injure herself if she does break and takes up the slack.

(4) If you want to borrow this idea from me, you can give the dog a well-rehearsed pattern of great things happening back at the van after the honor. This is a mixed bag. The good news is that the dog has something to look forward to after the honor, making a break less likely. The bad news is that having a highly excited dog at the end of honor, like I do with my dogs, means you've got to figure out how to keep the dog in control when the judge releases you, instead of the dog racing back to the van before you can get on her leash. I'm thinking I won't do this with my next dog.

LL&L

Alligator Water Entry

Both Lumi and Laddie had problems on and off with water returns. It has perhaps been our single greatest training challenge, and this post is not on that general topic.

But Laddie had another problem that made his training even more difficulty, so I thought I'd highlight that problem here.

Laddie had no trouble with water entries during his first few months, but around the age of a year old, he suddenly became unable to enter water while carrying a retrieval article (training dummy or duck, for example). In a 4Q dog, the problem might have been masked by an ecollar-trained recall, but for Laddie, it became a major barrier.

In fact, it took weeks before I even realized what the problem was. For a long time, I thought it was simply a recall problem. But actually, Laddie had developed a phobia about the water entry itself.

I'm guessing that these were the steps that led to the problem:

1. Like most puppies, Laddie was uncomfortable from the beginning at crossing what I call the "swim-line", the transition when wading out when the dog is no longer able to touch bottom and must begin to swim.
2. Also like some puppies, Laddie apparently came to a solution: He would leap over the swim line as he entered the water. At the time, I thought it was exuberance, and it is a joy to watch. But I now believe that it was also an avoidance behavior.
3. That worked fine until one day Laddie must have been carrying an article in his mouth when he made one of those leaps, and it hurt. I'd guess it must have hurt quite bad because of the effect it had on him, or it must happened several times. I was not aware of the incidents at the time they happened, I only speculate that they occurred.
4. As a result, Laddie became afraid of those leaping water entries. But he had never learned to "alligator" into the water, simply pushing off when he reached the swimline. And his recall was not strong enough to pull him back to me despite the phobia.

[more to be added, on how I addressed the problem and how I'd avoid it in future]

Notes on RRR for Training Recall

[Another reply to a PGD post:]

On Jan 26, 2010, at 10:06 PM, another poster wrote:

You might try the book "really reliable recall" if you're having recall issues. The trick is to be more rewarding than whatever else is going on, so the dog wants to return to you.

I'm sorry, this is incorrect. Nearly every dog trainer -- and this doesn't just apply to field trainers -- soon realizes that if you have to be more rewarding than "whatever else is going on," it will be impossible to create a reliable recall in many dogs.

Some points about RRR in particular:

* The RRR program is wonderful for pet dogs and dogs in other sports. I used it with Lumi and it once saved her life, as documented in an article on recall by September Morn in Dog Fancy magazine some years ago.

* RRR does NOT depend upon you being more rewarding than whatever else is going on, nor does any other high-quality recall training program.

* RRR is unfortunately not adequate for training a field recall.

* Even if it were, RRR is explicitly NOT for everyday recall. According to Leslie Nelson, the woman who designed RRR, it will fall apart if you use it for routine recall. It continues to work ONLY if you save it for emergencies.

* An interesting phenomenon has been recorded by some people who've train RRR: It can actually cause undesirable responses to increase! The reason for this is that the RRR recall cue is highly reinforced, which turns it into a conditioned reinforcer, much like a clicker. For some dogs, the cue then actually acts like a clicker. For example, the dog is chasing a bicycle and the trainer calls "DARLING" (or whatever the RRR cue is). Yes, the dog puts on the brakes and comes running for treats, but in addition, the dog has just been reinforced ("clicked") for chasing the bicycle. Each time a bicycle goes by, the handler calls "DARLING" and the dog in effect gets clicked and treated again. This is called "shaping" (though of course it's inadvertent). One day, the dog catches the bicycle.

We can discuss the mechanisms of how a recall can be trained WITHOUT being more rewarding than whatever else is going on at some point in the future, but for now, I just want to clarify that nothing you can do can make you more rewarding than the things a field retriever discovers as alternatives in the field.

LL&L

The Field Recall

[This began as a reply I wrote on the PGD list; it's been heavily edited to add content I thought of after I posted it, and in this version bears little resemblance to the original post:]

On Jan 26, 2010, at 4:28 PM, another poster wrote:

One burning question for you. Do you have a reliable recall? If so what is your secret?

Hi. I'm not the person you addressed your question to, but I'd like to offer my own answer because it's such an important question.

First, a disclaimer: Both of my 2Q Goldens had failures in their most recent Senior Hunt Tests because of recall, so I have not yet proven that I have a complete solution.

On the other hand, they both have JH titles, one has a WC and a WCX, both have won First placements in club trials, they both have several Senior ribbons, and they both have excellent, though not yet perfect, recall.

I won't be so presumptuous as to tell you what I think you should do. But I will give you the instructions I intend to follow with my next puppy, whom I will also train exclusively with 2Q methods:

(1) Use a standard, high-powered recall program designed for general trainers, and get as much benefit out of that program as possible. I invented a program I call the Walking Recall in 2010. I've had more success with the Walking Recall than any other program I've ever used, and I've used many.

(2) Minimize retrieves in the first few months of the dog's introduction to field work. She should be hungry to retrieve at all times, including at the end of a session. I want that hunger to grow and grow. For starters, it might be a single retrieve per session. After a week, maybe two. After a month, maybe three. That might be it for the first six months. (You can train several sessions a day, so the puppy could get perhaps nine retrieves in a day, but only a small number per session, and only if the hunger level stays high.)

(3) Do not train retrieve-to-hand until you begin formal retrieve training, which might be after six months of earlier field work. I believe that retrieve-to-hand works against the field recall and should be delayed until the pup's recall is really field-hardened.

(4) Never put the dog in a situation where she can self-reinforce by refusing a retrieve unless you are 100% certain that she won't do it. If that means you must sit out some of the retrieves other people in your group are running, so be it. This is a huge psychological barrier.

(5) Having the dog on a long line may allow you to run her in situations where her return could otherwise not be fully trusted. Don't use the long line to punish a failed return by jerking on it, just use it for management. A long line is at the heart of the Walking Recall program mentioned above.

(6) If the dog does not return on cue, do NOT let her complete the retrieve, but DO cue her to sit/stay, walk out, quietly and gently slip on her lead, bring her back to the start line (no training, just walk her back quietly), and give her another chance to do the retrieve correctly.

(7) If the dog does not return after a single recall cue (whistle or voice), do not continue to use additional recall cues, but rather use the Walk Out described in the previous paragraph. Repeated recall cues may work initially, but they quickly deteriorate for an interesting reason: The recall cue is a highly reinforced stimulus, both by the act of completing the retrieve (the retriever's most powerful intrinsic reinforcer other than sex) and by the trainer's many and varied methods of extrinsic reinforcement for a successful retrieve. A highly reinforced stimulus gradually becomes a conditioned reinforcer (a clicker is an example). This means that if the dog dawdles, and you use your recall cue, you are reinforcing the dawdling. If the dog continues to dawdle, and you continue to call the dog, you are further strengthening the dawdling. In fact, you are in effect shaping the behavior of dawdling. It's a vicious cycle that only gets worse over time.

(8) As in your recall program, develop a graded set of distractions and locations for which the dog's recall is to be proofed. Here's a hard one: a retrieve across a channel where there's no way for you to reach her. When she can do each location, add diversions like someone playing with another dog on the far side, or a training partner throwing a dummy on the ground nearby just as she's picking up the bird. No matter how many locations and diversions she's been proofed for, realize that if a novel one occurs, there's a good chance she'll fail with it. So keep coming up with newer and more difficult ones.

(9) Do not get lulled into a false sense of security by how well your puppy's recall is coming along, and by how easy it is for your buddies to train a high-quality 4Q recall to their dogs. That is not useful information to a 2Q field trainer if it leads you to take shortcuts with your own puppy's recall training. It IS fairly easy for them. It will NOT be easy for you.

(10) The declining field recall is a great example of what the Kellers called "instinctive drift" in their landmark article "Misbehavior of Organisms". The subject learns a desired behavior, gets huge reinforcement for it, is never once reinforced by the trainer for an undesired behavior, and yet begins to perform the undesired behavior more and more as the subject continues to practice. The more your pup retrieves, the more her instincts will beckon to her to fail on the recall, so even as you reinforce her success, she is still increasingly exposed to the suction of the undesired behavior. If you don't want that to defeat you (it DID in fact defeat the Kellers), keep up your guard and EXPECT a once-reliable and highly reinforced recall to start failing.

That's my list for now. It's not my complete training program, it just addresses the one subject of field recall.

Best of luck with your dog! I hope you keep us up-to-date with your adventures together.

Lindsay, with Lumi & Laddie (Goldens)